Another stellar piece of reporting by Evan Osnos of The New Yorker. This week, he looks at the growth of gambling in Macau and tells us why Las Vegas is moving there: more ›

Macau serves as Asia's top gambling haven but for all its allure, it's lacking in broader tourist appeal. According to MGM CEO Grant Bowie, Macau needs another ten years to achieve Las Vegas-style status with exhibitions, convention halls, and wholesome entertainment. As it stands, 95% of profits are created by gambling--compare that with its progenitor which generates more than 50% of its sales from non-casino related transactions. more ›

Oh my Obama. The first thing we noticed when we arrived for the Obama Club’s soft opening party last night is that the place is massive! You could see the sign from two minutes away in a cab and we were already wondering how much they spent on the Las Vegas styled water display out front. No sign of the pink leg that was on their logo so that was a bit of a disappointment. Said to be designed by renowned American interior designers Cagley and Tanner from Las Vegas, the circular built club however had a familiar karaoke glow (think CashBox 钱柜) to it with golden fixtures and golden dance poles. more ›

If Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas isn't checked off your list of classic must-see movies, Vienna Café will help you sort this out on Thursday! Johnny Depp styled to the point of impossibility of recognition, an immensely decadent ride through Las Vegas casinos and hotel rooms, one of the most vivid depictions of a psychedelic drug rush and in the same time a crucial part of journalistic history. Legendary reporter Hunter S. Thompson made the journey that became a book that became a movie... more ›

Two ex-Bank of China managers (and their wives) have been given lengthy sentences for their parts in an elaborate scheme to swindle money out of China and move to the United States. The couples laundered money from China into false corporations and personal accounts in Hong Kong, Canada and the U.S. and obtained false identities and entered into fake marriages to settle in Las Vegas. They were eventually arrested in 2004 and found guilty last year. Xu Chaofan and Xu Guojun, the two banking masterminds, were given 25 and 22 years each respectively. Their wives both got eight years each. Still, their sentences sound much more preferable to the fate of a third manager, Yu Zhengdong, who actually helped authorities catch the wayward bankers - despite his cooperation with investigators, he is now languishing in a Chinese jail. Source: BBC more ›

Normally, job postings on Las Vegas' Craigslist for nightclub managers would never catch our attention. Make that nightclub a KTV disco nightclub and put it in Shanghai, and we start to get curious. Make the annual salary for said position between $100k and $400k USD, and we're printing out résumés: more ›

Over this weekend, Blue Frog celebrated its grand opening in Macau's Venetian in a glitzy event that featured performances by Shaolin monks, Australian DJ Alex Taylor and Shanghai's very own Sugar Mama and the Cotton Club Band. Apparently, quite a number of people flew over from Shanghai for the event (too bad for us, we were never invited). In this video, Blue Frog looks a lot more like a club than anything else, and certainly... more ›

The $2.4 billion Venetian Macao Resort Hotel is finally open for business on Macau's Cotai, and can you believe our local Blue Frog is somewhere in that building? Las Vegas Sands claims the 10.5 million square foot Venetian — twice the size of the Las Vegas original — is the largest building in Asia. Sands' next casino in Asia -- which at US$3.6 billion will be one of the costliest casino-resorts ever -- will open up in Singapore. But reports have come in that the development cost will swell by up to US$1.44 billion due to an Indonesian sand ban. Fuelled by strong growth in gaming revenues, the Macau economy has ballooned 28.9% in the first half of the year. more ›

We just got word that Blue Frog will be opening a restaurant at the Venetian Macao-Resort-Hotel on August 28th. From their press release: more ›

Even as 85-year-old Macau gambling mogul Stanley Ho is in hospital undergoing treatment for constipation and an injured rectum, the word is out that Macau has overtaken Las Vegas as the world's biggest casino draw. Macau's 22 casinos raked in over US$7 billion last year while Las Vegas' 40 casinos lagged behind at US$6.6 billion. more ›

While the rest of the world is wondering how George W. Bush will further fuck up Iraq and where Becks and Posh are going to settle in L.A., we came across a report about a concert event in Las Vegas: more ›

The two photos above are from Shanghai. The second, we think, is Shanghai Railway Station. Barbieri's work comes to our city as part of the Shanghai Biennale and the Year of Italy in China. More Biennale events are listed here. more ›

Phillyist keeps it fresh by getting a new motto, learning to prioritize, and taking in an experimental indie rock show. more ›

Could big-time boxing be headed to China? If Hasim Rahman defeats your-favorite-and-ours Oleg Maskaev August 12 in Las Vegas, maybe. (Although we admit it's hard to call any heavyweight bout from the past 15 years or so "big time.") ESPN.com's Dan Raphael writes: more ›

This unhealthy obsession with movies is going to stop soon ... but first, we just have to tell you what we just heard. more ›

Photo by CaptainVideo taken from the Shanghaiist photos page. To see your photos on our photos page, use Flickr and tag your photos "shanghaiist". Or you can email your photos to photos@shanghaiist.com and they will automatically appear on our site. more ›

Remember back in late 2004 when plans for a Playboy "lifestyle club" in Shanghai were announced and then halted over the span of a couple days? Well, a look at the minutes from a recent Playboy conference call with investors shows there is still hope for the Bunnies to hop over the Huangpu: more ›

More people should have listened to analyst Kelvin Tan of Las Vegas Sands, the Nevada-based hotel, gaming and retail corporation. When reports began appearing on various horse-racing websites at the end of October stating that Beijing Jockey Club had been awarded an unprecedented 12-month gambling license, Mr Tan swam against the tide, maintaining that the Chinese government would continue to restrict betting to table games in border casinos. Had his bearish stance been adopted earlier by the main drivers behind the Beijing Jockey Club’s ambitious breeding, training and racing programme -- namely Hong Kong businessman Yun Pung Cheng and his racing director Kevin Connolly -- things might not have taken as dramatic a turn as they did in the last month, when more than 600 thoroughbreds were given lethal injections as fortunes at the club waned. In a country where considerably less humane slaughter methods are widely employed, the mass-euthanasia has been described by the chief executive of the International League for the Protection of Horses as “a tragedy, but not one as bad as neglect, starvation or being sold to work in front of a cart for the rest of your days”. Nonetheless, with the 2008 Olympics looming, it is a major PR blow for animal-unfriendly China, which is having to stage its Olympic equestrian events in Hong Kong as a result of being unable to provide adequate quarantine provision. Not to mention a huge blow for the 600 horses who met their maker. more ›

• It's "rat breeding season" in Shanghai and the city is running a "rat sweep" campaign through November 11. "Businesses and residents will be able to get information about rats, how to control, catch and kill them, from their local health campaign office." Lovely.
• The first Miss Hooters China was crowned recently -- and there are three of them. "I can meet new friends, broaden my mind and have fun," said Zhou Shouya, one of the winners who has a chance to join the 10th annual Hooters International Swimsuit Pageant in Las Vegas next year. "Hooters makes me happy. I can't change the weather but I can change my mood."
• A man in Baoshan District agreed to buy an apartment there, but now he wants out of the contract. Why? The previous owner murdered his lover and dismembered her body there. For some reason, the real estate agent neglected to mention this.

It was just over a year ago that Shanghaiist was with a company -- whose CEO is rumored to have been beaten-up by thugs at least once and possibly arrested for fraud by Chinese police -- that was commissioned to write up a business plan for a Chinese developer based in People's Square, looking to add a little amusement park gaudiness to the Square's collection of museums. The developer had been making frequent trips between London and Shanghai, working hard at luring the Tussauds Group into China. But Shanghaiist never heard anything more about a wax museum for the city and assumed Shanghai was safe. Until now: more ›

The Crystal Method at Miami's 2005 Winter Conference music festival more ›